Studies In Short Form Storytelling
by Deangerous
Summary: Random one shots about the group's lives at Greendale, with some Jeff/Annie and Troy/Britta thrown in.
1. Sleeping At Sea For Beginners

**AN: Hey it's a Community fanfic. Much like most of my other fics, this one's going to be a collection of one shots mostly, with a few ships, but mainly Jeff/Annie, Britta/Troy and maybe a little Troy/Abed. It'll also include a lot of random comedy one shots and so forth...**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Community. I will however trade whoever owns it for £1.60 and a nearly complete collection of Babylon 5 DVD's (Maybe).**

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**Sleeping At Sea For Beginners**

Jeff threw his suit jacket aside, letting it crumple on the floor of the study room without a care. As soon as he'd heard the '30's Gangster' themed picnic would have a 'small, innocent' game of paintball assassin played at it, he'd rushed to the nearest, cheapest store and brought the cheapest suit that still made him look good.

Now that it was covered in enough glittery paint to drown Mardi Gras, he was extremely grateful for his own forethought (He was working on the narcissism, he swore).

Behind him came Annie, barefoot and angry. She wore a somewhat stunning red dress that was marred by a horrible green paint splodge right in the stomach.

"I still don't understand how the bullet got me through the window. I wasn't close enough for it to go that way. It makes no sense!" she said angrily, stamping her foot.

"Yeah yeah." Jeff said bitterly, flopping down on one of the couches. "I don't see why Leonard had to put glitter in that paint bomb he threw at me. I'm going to look like Tinkerbell for weeks"

"Well I think you look pretty" Annie said, grinning as she moved to lie on one of the other couches. Unfortunately, both the others were covered in paint. Jeff had nabbed the only clean one and now he was half asleep.

Luckily for Annie, her slowly increasing self confidence gave her an idea of how to deal with Jeff. She bent low, hooking her hands together tightly in her lap and smiled innocently.

"Jeff, could you please move?" she said, assuming what she hoped was the perfect medium between innocent and sultry.

He didn't even look. He did however, roll over slightly and offer her an arm to curl up in. She glared at him for a moment before sliding in to it. She was tired and... it did look comfortable.

They were sound asleep in moments.

* * *

"I have to admit, rigging that paint bomb to go off when we turned the key to get in to the Chemistry Lab was rather brilliant..." Britta said tiredly as she and Troy entered the study room. "Like in... a mafia movie. Help me here Troy"

"Too tired. Brain... shhh" Troy replied.

"You can't sleep yet" Britta said loudly, before she noticed Jeff and Annie on the couch and shh'ed Troy's presumably loud reply. "Look at them. Aren't they cute?" Troy took a moment to regard them.

"Can I sleep now?" he eventually said, though Britta noticed him discreetly wiping a tear away.

"Where do you want to sleep exactly?" Britta asked sarcastically.

"Bean bags and blankets from when our apartment was fumigated. In the cupboards where those old testbooks with penises drawn in were kept" Troy directed her. Britta went and came back with a pair of bean bags and a pair of blankets a moment later. She threw one blanket over Jeff and Annie and placed the two bean bags next to each other.

"We'll just have to share the blanket" she said.

"You're the best Britta" Troy mumbled as he fell in to the nearest bean bag. She smiled a little, a hand going by reflex to her hair to twirl it around her finger before she stopped and chastised herself for acting like a school girl. Instead, she just slumped in the other bean bag and pulled the blanket over the pair of them.

As she drifted off though, she felt a hand slip in to hers.

* * *

Shirley entered her house and instantly met her husbands stare with a sigh.

"Paintball" was all she had to say, before heading to their bed to collapse.

* * *

"Sorry about the shooting you Ay-bed" Pierce jovially said to Abed, patting him on the shoulder.

"It's OK. All's fair in paintball. And I won in the end so..." Abed replied easily.

The pushed through the doors in to the study room, and saw the sleeping group. They both stopped for a moment, and quietly moved to sit on the table and watch them.

They watched the four sleep, until eventually Abed spoke in a whisper.

"Is this how it felt being left out of the group Pierce?" he said. Pierce almost made a crack back at him, but he heard Abed sound something very unusual.

He heard him sound human.

He watched Abed quietly for a moment. Abed was watching Troy intently, his eyes zeroed in on . Then smiled.

"Not at all. They aren't excluding us on purpose. They're just... happy with each other" Pierce said sounding... content.

"You've shown a lot of character growth Pierce" Abed said.

"Thanks Abed" Pierce replied.

"Maybe we could be... happy together" Abed said after a second, carefully resting his head on Pierce's shoulder. They sat like this for a moment.

"No this is wrong. Horrible. Bad, wrong and terribly horrible" Pierce said.

"Yes I feel... disquieted..." Abed said. They both stood and, with a nod of solidarity, forgot the incident ever happened.

"So, Ay-bed, you like those Star War movies right?" Pierce asked as they both began walking quickly from the scene of the... horrible, wrong, soul destroying moment.

"Yes"

"Wanna come over mine and watch them. I have them on old VHS tapes. I saw the first one in the cinema"

"I haven't seen the original versions since I was a kid, and hearing about the original viewings... Cool. Cool cool cool"

And they left the study room, leaving the two pairs to sleep.

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**Yes, the title is a pun about shipping. **

**If you feel like dropping me a review, favourite or alert please do so :D If you don't, however, thank for reading.**


	2. Flights Of Fantasy: FTII

**AN: Here's another one. in what I'm hoping will be a reaccuring element, the group playing D&D.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Community. Not since NBC took away my crayon written contract stating I owned it, signed by a Ryan Seacrest look alike.**

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**Flights Of Fantasy For The Imagination Impaired**

"OK, so I shoot magic missile at the goblins" Annie the Cute (Or, as Britta the Surly had dubbed her, Annie the Full Of Herself) said nervously.

"It hits" Abed the Gamemaster intoned a moment later, after some cosmic dice rolls. "The goblin in front falls to the ground bleeding" Annie the Cute let out a small 'eep' of happiness at that. "Britta it's your go"

"OK so I... sing? Maybe it can... calm them down. Do I have to be the bard you guys?" Britta the Surly whined. Abed rolled a dice and noted something.

"Two goblins fall to the floor, holding their ears in pain."

"Shocking" Jeff the Handsome snarked as Troy the Well Endowed discreetly handed Pierce the Dickish But Reforming ten dollars. Britta looked offended but stayed quiet. This was one of the few useful things she'd done so far in the campaign. After their first go around of D&D Abed had allowed the group to create their own characters for their next, longer campaign. Everyone had, surprisingly, decided to play. It had, after all, turned out rather fun the last time.

"That leaves four" Abed said. "They fire arrows at you. One hits Jeff the Handsome in the arm"

"Did it tear my armour?" Jeff asked, worriedly. "It's hard to match mail with your hair and make it look like you don't care about your mail matching your hair... Which I don't" he finished with a quick glance at the studies group.

"No, you just take four damage and are now bloodied" Abed said.

"Oh OK"

"I draw me sword and charge the goblins" said Neil the Cuddly (So named by his girlfriend Vicki).

"Ones head comes flying off and lands at Vicki the Unnoticable's feet" Abed said.

"Does that mean I'm out of hiding?" Vicki asked.

"Not yet" Abed said.

"OK, I backstab the nearest goblin" she continued. Abed rolled a dice.

"It dies. There's two left" Abed said. They all turned to Pierce, who grinned confidently.

"I dive at both, attempting to grapple them" Pierce declared, grinning in that annoying 'Ha! I'm still a little bit evil!' way.

"NO! Not again. I'm not sitting through another grapple" Jeff shouted, half standing. Annie joined him, looking ready to scream until Jeff placed a finger to her lips. "I'm also not hearing Annie scream like last time"

"It wasn't fair" Annie said against his finger. "I didn't know a Sorcerer couldn't grapple"

"You were wearing frilly pink robes facing a seven foot tall Orc Annie. What did you expect?" Jeff shot back.

"It doesn't matter anyway" Abed cut in, staring intently at the dice he'd rolled. "Pierce wont get there until next turn"

"Why not?" Pierce asked, offended.

"Age modifier, plus the fact that barbarians don't wear heavy plate" Abed said, looking at his notes.

"What do I look like to you? So kinda poof-" Pierce started, before receiving seven identical glares. "...fish. A puff fish?" he finished lamely, though he did show a small grin when Annie shot him an approving nod.

"Am I still a bear?" Troy asked eagerly as all eyes turned to him.

"Yes" Abed replied. Troy grinned.

"That's awesome" he said, and he and Abed quickly shared their handshake before he continued. "I swipe them"

"You kill them both. You find a gold's worth of coin on them" Abed said, nodding approvingly.

"OK gang. I'll pack the coin, Troy, turn in to a bird and scout. Shirley, heal everyone up, you guys, take a break" Jeff said with a disarming smile. The group went about it, troy bemoaning that he was only a pigeon and Shirley complaining it seemed sacrilegious to use some 'satanic evil power' to heal people.

No one noticed that Jeff, who hadn't actually done anything in the battle, had just taken all the loot from the encounter.

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**Here's the classes for anyone who cares (4th Edition):**

**Britta-Bard (Because it's just too easy)**

**Annie-Wizard (It's a controller type. once again too easy)**

**Shirley-Paladin (Was going to be a cleric but that would mean there would be three leader type in the group and that's just silly)**

**Jeff-Warlord (Leader that focuses on charisma)**

**Pierce-Barbarian (Like Conan the Barbarian whom I'm assuming Pierce thinks is cool ala Beastmaster) **

**Troy-Druid ('I can turn in to animals? AWESOME!')**

**Neil-Fighter (His class in the show)**

**Vicki-Rogue (Because she goes mostly unnoticed) **

**Please leave a review or something if you liked... or disliked... Or think I owe you money...**


	3. Intro To Time Travel

**AN: Here's another one **

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**Intro To Time Travel**

"No" Jeff said firmly, glaring at Troy and Abed coolly. "You are not time travellers. I've played your games. I apologised on 'Troy and Abed in the morning'-"

"_Troy and Abed in the moooorning_" the pair sung under their breaths as Jeff continued.

"-I krumped" he continued, ignoring the pairs little outburst. "I helped decorate the Christmas Troy, which, yes, was fun but... the point stands. I'm done. We are this close to the year ending, I want at least one week I don't have to talk to my therapist about. You. Are not. Time travellers"

"But we came from the future" Abed insisted calmly.

"We came to warn you about all the awful stuff that's genna happen next year" Troy added.

"Pierce will become addicted to painkillers" Abed continued smoothly.

"Shirley'll get pregnant and think it was Chang's" Troy picked up, swinging in to the pairs usual rhythm.  
"But it wasn't" Abed confirmed.

"There were zombies" Troy said, looking a little fearful at the prospect.

"The Dean will start wearing outfits" Abed said, causing Troy to look more scared, and both to repress a shudder.

"You and Britta boning will mess up the entire group" Troy said with a small, almost jealous glare at Jeff.

"And, worst of all, we'll have to do a bottle episode!" Abed finished, somehow managing to look more horrified than Troy.

"Uhuh. Guys. I know that, sometimes, you like too... play games or whatever. But that sounds absolutely ridiculous before you factor in the time travel" Jeff started slowly. "I mean, this year has been a little odd at times-"

"Paintball" Abed shot at him, as if expecting his response.

"Chicken fingers" Troy continued. Those two slipped in to a rhythm slow quickly it was scary.

"Naked billiards" said Abed.

"And me and Pierce dancing with Chang" Troy finished with a shudder.

"Off the top of our heads" said Abed, still as infuriatingly calm as ever.

"OK, very odd... But... YOU AREN'T FROM THE FUTURE" Jeff snapped, his right eye twitching. With that, he turned on his heel and left, spluttering under his breath.

"Oh well, that was fun" Abed said, still cool.

"Yeah. Wanna go watch Twilight Zone?" Troy said.

"Sure" said Abed, and the two turned and headed towards his dorm.

"Abed do you... you think any of that stuff is going to happen?" Troy said, looking slightly worried.

"Eh. Probably not. It's all just the math of what would fit in t a good second season. More drama, some experimental and wacky episodes..." Abed trailed off, as if doubting himself.

"Do I get to do anything good next season?" Troy asked hopefully.

"Hmmm. You might meet Levar Burton" Abed said after a moments consideration. Troy was dumbstruck for a moment.

"I CAN'T. I'LL DISSAPOINT HIM. I CAN'T TAKE THAT PRESSURE" he shouted, sprinting ahead of Abed, holding an arm to his eyes to hide the sudden onslaught of tears. Abed paused behind him for a second, before following after him at a jog.

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**Thanks for reading. Leave a review if you enjoyed"! Or want to criticise me!**


	4. Natural Habitats of Pack Animals

**AN: Wow, I'm predicting this string of every day chapters ends within the week. **

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**Natural Habitats Of Pack Animals**

"What do you mean the study room is closed?" Jeff asked, his voice tinged with anger. He looked about ready to punch the (Surprisingly happy looking) Dean in the face.

"Now guys" the dean said calmingly. The whole group was thankful that this was one of the rare occasions he didn't have a costume for "There are over groups in this college that meet in that room. It's not my fault if they, one one occasion, have a meeting that overlaps with your meeting. You don't own the room"

"Yes we do, we booked it for right now" Annie piped up from her position at Jeff's right arm. She pulled out the photocopy of the study room schedule she'd made for just this occasion and showed it to the Dean.

"Annie have you ever considered not being a huge nerd?" Jeff asked her, taking his eyes off the Dean for a moment to fix his eyes on her. She bristled in response.

"Have you ever considered not being a huge ass for ten minutes?" Annie replied heatedly. She accepted a quick high five from Britta before turning back to the Dean, who was examining the sheet.

"Well I'm sorry, I'm not kicking them out" the Dean said, looking a little shifty. Jeff peered over his shoulder and caught a quick peak though one of the blinds that hadn't properly closed.

"Are those people dressed as dalmatians?" Jeff asked, appalled. The Dean just silently patted Jeff's chest and headed inside. "I think I may be scarred for life" Jeff noted dryly.

"Let's just go find somewhere else to study" Shirley said in her best nice voice. "I'm sure the Deans... sexual perversions will be over soon"

The group shrugged and headed off to find another room.

* * *

They'd eventually found another room, this one with one long, thin table. Jeff had taken the head spot, with Annie on his left and Shirley on his right. Britta was next to Shirley, whilst Troy and Abed were next to Annie. Pierce had taken a spot by himself at the opposite end of the table to Jeff. At first it had seemed great to change the groups spaces up, if only slightly. Shirley didn't have to sit next to Pierce. Troy and Abed didn't have a table corner from keeping them apart. Jeff and Annie's legs were conveniently touching...

Quickly though, the group discovered they were in a rather delicate studying balance...

"Troy, Abed, stop messing about" Annie said, turning to the pair, annoyed. They turned and smiled at her innocently.

"Its just... Without the corner edge between us? Its like we're closer" Troy said. Annie sighed and rolled her eyes, turning to Jeff.

"Jeff, tell them to stop messing around" she said, with a quick bout of Disney eyes.

"I'm not this groups strange father figure" Jeff declared, glaring at her. She huffed.

"Really, that shirt says otherwise, _dad_" Britta chipped in, grinning over Shirley, who suddenly looked very uncomfortable.

"Is that in your opinion as a psych major?" Jeff replied snarkily. They were now arguing over a rapidly shrinking Shirley. Troy and Abed were back to playing whatever game they were playing, with Annie desperately trying to break in behind them. She and Jeff were both quickly distracted though as their legs brushed, allowing Britta to retort.

"No, its in my opinion as a woman attracted to men who aren't a creepy quasi-father figure" she replied.

"Men. Whatever you say Brittles" Pierce laughed. Britta, Jeff, Annie, Troy and Abed were all to busy to scold him, but as Shirley tried to she was overridden by Jeff and Britta's continued argument.

"No, just the ones that are horrible for you" Jeff said, slightly distractedly.

"Which explains why I was attracted to you" Britta half shouted back. Jeff was about to retort, but paused for a moment.

"Annie, please stop rubbing your leg against mine, its making it hard to argue with Britta" Jeff growled at Annie, who instantly turned to the almost crying Disney face in response. If he didn't know Annie was too innocent for that, Jeff would swear that Annie was a master manipulator. "Annie I'm sorry, I didn't mean to snap-" Annie just glared in response.

"Jeff you hurt Annie's feelings" Britta accused. Jeff instantly turned back to her and continued their argument, now full throttle.

The group continued like this for a while. Jeff and Britta shouting over a quiet Shirley, Pierce making dirty comments to the air, Annie's eyes watering and Troy and Abed mucking around until Abed finally turned to the group.

"Guys" he shouted, causing them all to fall quiet. "Its obvious that our group can't handle even this slight change of scenery. We have all adapted to deal with different situations by interacting with those around us in particular ways. Jeff and Britta snark at one another, but override anyone caught in between. Pierce seeks attention through his sexist, racist and homophobic comments, which he receives from either Troy or Shirley. Me and Troy need the slight splitting that comes from having a table corner between us. Annie and Shirley need to band together when Jeff and Britta need to be brought to heel. And the slight distance between Jeff and Annie allows them to not get constantly caught up in their unresolved sexual attention"

There was a moments silence, before Annie made her now almost trademark 'Ah' noise of offence.

"There is NO sexual tension here" Annie said, motioning to her and Jeff.

"Jeff, move your right leg two inches to the right please" Abed said. Jeff did so, and both he and Annie suddenly blushed. "Point. Now, I think we should go and retake the study room and fix the imbalance in our group"

There was a moments silence, and then the whole group nodded in unison. "Agreed"

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**Hope you enjoyed!**


	5. Playing Video Games For Fun And Profit

**AN: Finished an essay and this AND watched Utopia all in one night? I should probably sleep at some point before I get up obscenely early to go to college. **

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**Playing Video Games For Fun And Profit**

"You know, playing that video game with you guys was pretty fun.. I've never really played much before" Annie said one day, as they sat around the table in Chez Troannibed.

"We should do a video game night" Abed said straight away in response.

"That's an awesome idea!" Troy replied, and they shared their handshake.

"I suppose it might not completely suck" said Jeff, not looking up from his phone. "Though you are talking to someone who owned an NES"

"Wow. Children in Africa were dying and you owned an NES" said Britta, to accompanying groans. "Anyway, video games are all jingoistic propaganda trying to brainwash you to do whatever you're told by the man" she continued to more groaning.

"You are the human embodiment of Windows Vista" Troy said to her.

"It would be nice to have a night away from the children..." Shirley ploughed through.

"I haven't got anything better to do. The house is cold and lonely" said Pierce.

"So when should we do it then?" Abed asked the group as a whole. They all looked at one another nervously.

"I'm not doing anything tonight" Britta admitted quietly. The rest of the group quickly, and ashamedly, admitted to as much as well.

* * *

"OK, Annie. This is Skyrim. You can find a spouse, save the world from dragons, do whatever you like. Fallout New Vegas really has more choice in term of what you can do story wise, but that's probably a bit too complex to start with" Abed said, plopping Annie down in front of the Xbox.

"So I use the stick thingy to move?" she asked. Behind her Jeff snorted and Pierce and Troy shared a silent fist bump as Britta rolled her eyes at them.

"Yes"

"OK. I'm... I'm going!" Annie exclaimed as, on screen the camera began to move. This happened for a moment until Annie came across a chicken. "Look! A chicken! Can I pick it up? Is it this button?" Annie said, hitting the right bumper.

Troy and Abed both leapt forward, screaming "No!" as the on screen chicken was immolated. Annie's face fell.

"Now the guards will try and kill you" Abed noted.

"Good, I'm a horrible chicken murderer! I should be killed!" Annie shouted, before throwing the controller down and running to her room, hiding her now tearing up face. Jeff quickly followed her.

"She got in to that kinda quickly" Troy said to the rest of the group, who looked a mixture of appalled and amused.

* * *

"Oh look, another military shooter. Who are we fighting this time? Russians? Taliban? Another of America's convenient enemies?" Britta accused/asked.

"Super religious aliens" Troy said, handing Britta a controller and picking one up for himself as they watched the Halo title screen. "Who want to destroy the Earth"

"Have we tried talking to them?" Britta shot back.

"Yes. They shot us" Abed said, looking at Annie's bedroom door intently. "They've been in there a while"

"Whatever. So, we're fighting aliens? Who declare us against their religion and try to wipe is out?" Britta asked.

"Yes" Troy replied.

"Huh. I might be able to get behind that" Britta said, as they opened fire on some Covenant. Abed sighed next to them.

"What if this turns in to another Jeff and Britta?" Abed asked. "Us eventually becoming Friends seems a good way to peter out in season five or so"

* * *

Jeff, Abed, Shirley and a tempted out Annie (Nobody new what she'd been tempted out with, but she had been smiling broadly) sat on the couch, each holding an Gamecube controller.

"So, this has Mario in it?" Shirley asked. On the confirmatory nods she said "That's nice"

"Does everyone understand how to play?" Abed asked the other three, and they all nodded.

"We smash and we brawl. Simple" said Annie, with a small self confirming nod.

The game of Super Smash Bros Brawl began, with Jeff and Abed each playing coolly, collectedly, whilst Annie and Shirley mashed buttons.

This quickly turned to their advantage however, as both Jeff and Abed were quickly thrown off the stage, much to Jeff's disgust.

"They're just hitting buttons!" he exclaimed, before feigning disinterest by playing on his phone.

"It's a common joking point with gamers that the new players win by mashing buttons. However, here we have two new players, both mashing buttons. So, who knows what way it could go" Abed said in his usual detached, meta style.

"Oh god"

The match went on for a while, as both Shirley and Annie, with less people to aim at, seemed to find it impossible to hit each other.

Until:

"We both fell of at the same time?" Annie said, in the dangerous calm that betrayed an oncoming storm of anger. "WE BOTH FELL OFF AT THE SAME TIME"

* * *

Whilst the rest of the group calmed down and cleared up the plates that had been smashed, Pierce had snuck on to the Xbox. He's quickly put in some Call of Modern Warduty game, and somehow stumbled in to an online match.

With a headset on.

The rest of the group gathered, intrigued and repulsed, as he blundered his way through the match, meeting every thirteen year old swear for swear, bigoted obscenity for bigoted obscenity.

The second he died (After a surprisingly long period of time) he threw the controller down, exclaimed "I'm done with this crap!" and stormed from the apartment.

"So... no more game nights?" Jeff suggested, to a quick set of agreements.

* * *

The apartment was dark. Troy and Abed were asleep in their blanket fort, and Shirley and Britta had left a while ago.

So, in the darkness, with only the illumination of the TV lighting the pair, Jeff and Annie sat, snug in a blanket, visiting death and destruction on the aliens on the screen.

"This is nice" Annie said with a grin. "This was your favourite game when you were young?"

"Yeah. I played it with my Dad once... He's the only person I've ever met who could make it all the way through" Jeff said with a small, almost fond smile. "Sorry, I don't usually... Tell people... Stuff"

"That's OK" Annie replied. She didn't want to press the topic. Jeff opening up even that much was rare, and forcing it would probably just annoy him. "Isn't Contra a little violent for a kid though?" she asked as they blew up a group of enemies.

"Wait till you see Doom kid" he said, taking a hand momentarily off the controller to pat her head.

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**Hope you enjoyed! Review if you'd like?**


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